First Nations Launching Major Constitutional Challenge to Kill Bill 5, the Ford Government's Megadevelopment Law and Bill C5, Canada's Megaprojects Law
"These laws authorize the Crown governments to approve on a fast track major projects like Ring of Fire mining and pipelines, by short circuiting the need to get critical information about human and environmental safety and impacts and without involving the very peoples whose lands these projects would eat up," says Alderville First Nation Chief Taynar Simpson. "Our case is not a fight against development, it is a fight against dangerous development pushed ahead by factless, thoughtless and reckless decision making from government Ministers behind closed doors with little accountability."
"We First Nations are not against development per se. This is not about a battle between development and not," says Chief Todd Cornelius from Oneida Nation of the Thames. "It is about doing things recklessly and doing things right."
Both Bill 5 (provincial) and Bill C5 (federal) would authorize major projects without the need for proponents to apply for or get various permits and approvals, such as for environmental assessment, environmental protection, water taking, endangered species protection, cultural heritage assessment and the like. "Rushing headlong into major projects without knowing the costs, means the governments are playing a dangerous game with our lands and futures. In the Ring of Fire area, this could be disastrous. That region is peatlands, which is a globally critical carbon sink that must stay intact if it is to counter climate change. If parts of it are destroyed through mining and infrastructure, this could unravel the whole thing, and that would be catastrophic," says Attawapiskat First Nation Chief Sylvia Koostachin-Metatawabin. "Our way of life, our children's futures, and our shared environment which is the basis of all life, is not a pawn in some political game."
"The Crown governments are using the Trump tariffs as an excuse to say that all of this development is suddenly urgent. But these tariffs are not likely to be around forever and may well be gone before anything can be built even on an expedited basis," says Chief Sheri Taylor of Ginoogaming First Nation. "Panicking over the short term is not a reason to sacrifice the very values Canada says it holds dear and long term viability of lands and people. If Canada and Ontario are so worried about threats to Canada from a bullying US President whose administration has been stripping human rights protections, then why are Canada and Ontario supposedly answering those threats with their own laws that bully First Nations and strip human rights and environmental protections here? Would that not make this country the very thing we are trying to avoid being imposed on us?"
Chief June Black of Apitipi Anicinapek Nation says, "Bill 5 and Bill C5 are severe setbacks in the relationship between First Peoples of this land from whom far too much has been taken already and who are trying to get some of that back. We have the right to pursue our ways of life on our lands including to be part of the decision making about major developments that would take land and choices away from us. We should be moving toward a shared future and not a dictatorial one."
For further information contact:
Kate Kempton, Senior Counsel, Woodward and Co. Lawyers LLP
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 416-571-6775
Lina Santana
Email: [email protected])
Phone: 647-472-6838
SOURCE Woodward & Co.
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